Seventh Wonder

by Renae Kelleigh

  Possibly she wondered what Mr. Stovall’s response would be, though he’d hardly given her reason to expect any reaction other than polite interest. Indeed, his eyes remained creased in a smile, even while the corners of his mouth fell by a fraction.

  “You’re cold,” he said after a moment. She looked down, amazed to find goose bumps covering her arms. The chill in the air had affected her body without registering in her mind. She even shivered a little.

  The handsome stranger held out his hands in a helpless gesture, as if to signify his lack of a jacket to offer her. “Come on,” he said. “I’ll walk you back up to the lodge. Keep you from falling.” A teasing glint in his eye.

  Should she graciously decline? But then: “Thank you.” She spoke the words softly, her insides twisting.

  They sauntered down the path at a pace much slower than necessary. Mr. Stovall kept his hands in his pockets, but he walked close to Meg - so close his arm would occasionally brush against hers and leave a tingling burn in its wake. She felt her throat constricting as she dreamt of him weaving his arm around her shoulders, clutching her against him for warmth. Then she forced a breath, inwardly admonishing herself. What an imagination she had!

  Too soon, they reached the steps leading back up to the lodge’s veranda. “Thank you for walking me,” she said, only just mustering the pluck to meet his eyes. “I surely would’ve fallen if you hadn’t.”

  Her eyes sparkled with mischief; the corner of his mouth inched upward in another of his asymmetrical grins. “My pleasure.” He reached for her hand and lifted it to his lips in an unexpected gesture of farewell. She watched with lungs full and breath held as he pressed a kiss against the back of it. “Miss Lowry.” He touched his forehead as if doffing a hat.

  “Mr. Stovall.” That she found the ability to speak at all was nothing short of a miracle.

  “Please,” he said, as he turned to walk away, “call me John.”

  She watched as he receded into the shadows, as he vanished into the blackness. Long after she’d lost sight of him, she turned to look at the massive stone structure behind her. Inside, the lights blazed, and the orchestra played on. She climbed from the first step up to the second before changing her mind. Instead of returning to the lodge, she walked alone to her cabin.

  Chapter 2

  “Are you sure you’re feeling OK?”

  Meg glanced up from her bowl of oatmeal to find Rick looking at her from across the table. His knitted eyebrows bespoke his unease.

  “I’m fine,” she replied. “I woke up feeling much better.” She’d blamed her early departure from last night’s festivities on a pungent headache. It seemed more diplomatic than explaining she’d simply felt an irrepressible urge to be alone after her meeting with John. Now she wondered whether she might have simply imagined him.

  “Aren’t you hungry?” Rick asked, nodding at her barely touched breakfast.

  Honestly, no. But she hated giving him cause for concern. In response she dumped another spoonful of brown sugar and the rest of a small pitcher of cream into her bowl and stirred before taking a bite.

  They finished their meal in silence. As a waiter came to whisk their dishes away, the maître d’ approached the table with a message for Rick.

  “It’s my father,” he said, his expression inscrutable as his eyes flicked over the card he’d been given. Glancing up at Meg he said, “Will you walk with me?”

  “Now?”

  “I need to return his call first. Meet me outside in ten minutes?”

  Meg nodded. Why did her heart trip nervously as she thought of spending more time alone with him?

  Rick excused himself to use the telephone while Meg lingered, staring out at the hazy landscape. She’d overheard an employee telling one of the guests yesterday the canyon has its own weather system. At an elevation of over 8,000 feet, the north rim was the higher, cooler, wetter and more eroded side of the canyon, and from what she had witnessed thus far, its climate shifted nearly constantly.

  She passed Alan on her way out of the dining room. He was solitarily nursing a cup of coffee, very slowly coming awake despite the fact that it was well past ten in the morning. He looked stoned, but this was nothing unusual for him.

  “G’morning,” he said, lifting his hand in greeting.

  Meg paused next to his table. “How are you this morning?” she asked out of courtesy.

  He shrugged. “Been better, been worse. Hey, if you see any of the others, will you tell ‘em I’m not up for a hike just yet? I’m gonna hang back - catch up with you guys later.”

  She nodded, not letting on that this was the first she’d heard of a hike. It gave her an odd feeling to think she may have been intentionally excluded from the group’s plans. They must’ve forgotten to mention it to me, she thought, refusing to believe there had been some vicious ulterior motive at play.

  “See you later, Alan,” she said.

  “Later.”

  Seeing that Rick had yet to step out from his phone call, she meandered into an anteroom that tripled as an art gallery, museum and gift shop. She looked at the coffee mugs and picture books and selected a couple of postcards from the spinning rack on the front counter. It wasn’t until she was leaving, paper sack in hand, that her eyes caught on a beautiful charcoal drawing in a gilded frame. For reasons unclear, Meg felt compelled to inspect it closer, from the variable shading of the rock formations to the scribbled signature in the bottom left corner of the drawing. Her breath caught in a quiet gasp when she read the plaque mounted beneath it:

  Vista Encantada

  By John Stovall, Artist-in-Residence

  Here was her proof that she hadn’t been dreaming. He was real. And he was an artist.

  * * *

  “Sorry about that,” said Rick, taking her elbow to lead her away from the loitering tourists gathered on the lodge’s front porch.

  “Everything OK?”

  “Sure, sure. Just a business call mostly.” Rick had majored in civil engineering and was in position to join his father’s firm at the end of the month.

  Meg followed a half step behind Rick as he started up the lodge’s circular drive and turned onto a flat, shaded path that wove among the guest cabins. She was distracted, unable to focus on anything at all, save for her own imperfect memory of the few moments she’d shared with John.

  They walked until they came upon a rough-hewn picnic table. Rick stepped up onto the bench and sat on top of the table. He patted the space beside him, and Meg wordlessly joined him.

  After a minute had passed, and then two, and Rick still had yet to speak, Meg began to realize their walk may have implications beyond simply enjoying the sunlight. Typically he was a small talk aficionado.

  “You’re a great girl, Meg. You know that, right?” Finally he breathed the words that spelled the beginning of their end.

  She nodded stiffly, knowing what came next the way one knows that “DEF” follows “ABC.”

  Rick cleared his throat. He rubbed a hand over his face, and for a fleeting instant, Meg actually felt a little sorry for him.

  “Look. A lot of things change when you go away to college, and they change again when you move on from there and enter the ‘real world.’ Jesus, I mean, I never thought I’d wind up working for my old man, and now here I am, about to do just that. Sometimes things don’t turn out the way we expect them to.”

  He was rambling, but Meg didn’t really mind. Let him work up to it, she thought. Let him say what he needs to say.

  “I learned a lot about myself while I was at Berkeley - I’m sure you did, too - and I don’t think I’m the same person I was four years ago, or even six months ago...”

  His voice trailed off as he stared straight ahead, seemingly at a loss for words.

  “Six months ago,” said Meg, lending him a hand, “like when you met me?”

  Rick blew out a sigh. He met her eyes, if only for a split second. “I just don’t think we’re right for each other, you know?”
>
  And there it was. Now that the words were out, Meg felt relieved - relieved for him, and relieved for herself. What had they been playing at, anyway? They weren’t in college any longer. Soon Rick would go home to San Francisco, and she would be back in Santa Monica - at least until she was able to find a job of her own. They’d never shared a connection strong enough to weather the test of time, let alone distance. At least now they were finally addressing that fact openly.

  She realized he was waiting on her response. “I do know,” she said quietly, putting him out of his misery. She couldn’t hate him for speaking the truth.

  “So you’re not upset?” He seemed almost incredulous, as if he couldn’t fathom a reality where someone like Meg wouldn’t despair at the thought of losing someone like him. She rarely felt irritated with anyone, but an emotion resembling annoyance flared inside of her as she considered the extent of his egocentrism. How she wished he wouldn’t pity her.

  “I’m not upset,” she assured him.

  Moments passed, and it seemed increasingly as if there were nothing more to say. But then, if only to fill the silence, Meg asked, “Is there someone else?”

  She didn’t know what made her ask, since part of her already knew, and the other part was loath to hear his answer.

  “Do you really want me to answer that?” Rick said uneasily.

  She cocked her head, biting her lip. “It’s Alice, isn’t it?”

  His guilt-ridden grimace was answer enough. She tried on a synthetic smile, one that felt as if it fit rather poorly on her face. “I’m happy for you both, Rick. Really, I am. I wish you nothing but happiness.”

  It was true. Alice, with her cool demeanor and apollonian good looks, was doubtlessly a better match for him. Besides, Meg vaguely recalled hearing that Alice had accepted a position as an English teacher somewhere in the Bay Area. Theirs was a relationship that might actually work.

  Rick was visibly relieved. She’d as good as given him her blessing. Idly she wondered whether this was a sign of strength, or one of weakness.

  * * *

  The rain started just after lunch - gray, sheeting torrents of water that broke from the sky and rustled down the canyon’s eaves, along with thunder that rolled like far-off cannon. Their hike effectively canceled, the group bided their time in the common room of the lodge, playing board games, gossiping or, in Meg’s case, writing in her journal. She felt tense and jittery, anxious for the rain to end so she could be free of this place and the prying eyes of her travel companions. They seemed to have guessed what had happened between her and Rick, and their occasional, curious stares served only to deepen her sense of self-consciousness.

  Mercifully, the storm dissipated as quickly as it had begun, and the sun returned, glancing off puddles and giving the smooth stone deck the appearance of being glazed in light.

  “I’m going for a walk,” Meg announced to no one in particular as she stood from her chair and strode toward the door, her shoulder bag crossing her body.

  Being outside was a comfort. A cool humidity clung to the air, making her wish she had her jacket. Without giving it any sentient thought, she moved in the direction of the trail she’d taken last night.

  The overlook seemed like a different place entirely in the drab, muted light of day. Meg glanced unconsciously toward the stand of spruce. Of course, he wasn’t there. She wondered whether she would see him again, and whether she should be concerned about the twinge of disappointment she felt when she considered the possibility. Just what I need, she thought sardonically. Another hang-up on another artist.

  Beneath the trees, from where John had materialized the night before, the ground was mercifully dry. Meg sat against a tree with her legs bent and pulled her shoulder bag into her lap. She withdrew a well-worn copy of Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago. For some time she read, loving the weighted comfort of the book in her hands, the broken spine and soft, battered cover. She folded down the corner of her page, just as Yuri and his family were disembarking in Varykino, and leaned her head back against the tree’s knotted trunk. She closed her eyes and felt the breeze pass over her like a soothing hand, fluttering the pages of her book and ruffling the ends of her hair.

  Sometime later, a gray and white goshawk swooped down from its invisible flight path and alit on one of the topmost branches, instigating an impromptu rain shower that doused her hair and spattered the pages of her book. For some inexplicable reason, this struck Meg as comical. She laughed quietly to herself as she shook the water off her book and tucked it back inside her bag, then stood and brushed off the back of her pants. A glance at her wristwatch indicated she’d been here two hours, which wasn’t surprising considering the lack of sensation in her hindquarters.

  As she ambled back toward the lodge, she relished the warmth of the sun and wondered whether anyone had questioned her whereabouts. (In a part of her mind she wouldn’t quite allow herself to acknowledge, she also felt a familiar swell of regret at having spent the past two hours waiting for someone who hadn’t come.)

  When she reached the cabin she shared with the other girls, Faye was curled up on her side in the bed next to Meg’s while Jefferson Airplane streamed from a transistor radio atop the nightstand. At first glance she appeared to be asleep, but as Meg quietly slipped free of her bag, Faye rolled over to face her. She crooked her elbow and propped her head up with her hand as she fixed Meg with a look of interest.

  “Rick Iverson is a fucking asshole,” she said. Her expression failed to change as she spoke using the same inflection one would typically reserve for much more ordinary declarations.

  Meg was baffled. She could hardly manage more than a perfunctory “Oh?”

  “Don and I think it’s the pits that he’d make you ride all this way and then dump you the day after we get here. As if you could possibly enjoy your vacation after that.”

  The ancient mattress next to Faye’s sagged as Meg lowered herself on top of it. “It’ll be all right,” she replied, striving to portray a sense of aloof detachment. “We weren’t exactly soul mates.”

  Faye studied her with equal parts admiration and skepticism. “Good for you,” she said after a moment, though she still sounded doubtful.

  Meg spent even more time than she had the prior evening preparing for dinner. She brushed out her hair and used a hot iron to press it into a smooth, flat curtain, then secured it on either side with matching barrettes. She also applied sparing amounts of rouge and mascara and dressed in a pale blue dress without ruffles or bows. She tried not to think about what her motivation might be for looking her best. Faye voiced her assumption that Meg simply meant to prove to all interested parties she was better off without Rick, and Meg let her believe it.

  Dinner felt surreal. Paul and Mary Ann discussed shuttle schedules in preparation for the group’s planned excursion to the south rim; Don feigned interest in Alan’s monologue on the iniquity of the Nixon administration’s proposed draft lottery; and Faye spent a good deal of time glowering at Rick and Alice for their increasingly flirtatious behavior. Meg, for the most part, kept her eyes down. Only occasionally did she glance up, waiting to feel some pang of regret or jealousy as she beheld their constant whisperings; each time she was disconcerted by her lack of unease. Faye, certainly, was far more irate than she.

  After dinner, they congregated on the back deck. The clouds had cleared, leaving behind a streaking orange torch of a sun that drizzled like viscous honey into the canyon.

  They each staked their claim to a chair and commenced perusing leather bound cocktail menus as waiters bustled about with white aprons and oval trays. Meg was last to take her seat. It was then, as she glanced fleetingly outward to the rocks awash in color, that she noticed John Stovall standing farther along the railing. He clutched the long neck of a beer bottle as he watched her with thinly veiled interest.

  Meg lost her surefootedness, nearly stumbling as she laid down the final steps toward her chair. Her blood thrummed in her veins, seeing how he ling
ered at the edge of her peripheral vision.

  “Meg? Did you hear me?”

  She blinked at the calling of her name; to her right, Paul watched her perplexedly, apparently having been the one to address her. John’s attentiveness to her was proving to be exceptionally distracting.

  “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” she asked.

  “I asked if you want anything to drink.” He nodded toward an expectant waiter.

  She swallowed the dryness in her throat. “Chardonnay, please. And an ice water if you don’t mind.” She was flustered, and this shamed her. The waiter left to fetch her drink, and Paul returned to his conversation with Faye. Meg chanced a stealthy peek at John; she sucked her bottom lip into her mouth to keep from smiling when he again glanced her way.

  She felt his pull the way one feels gravity in plunging from a great height, during the transitory seconds before meeting the swell of the ground. Her friends’ banter continued in the background, but their lackadaisical efforts to include Meg went largely unnoticed.

  Minutes passed before she at last marshaled the courage to stand. Feeling half numb, she went to lean against the balustrade. For long moments, she didn’t dare drag her eyes away from the sinking sun as it hauled a frayed mantle of shadows over the canyon’s tortuous and deeply gouged ravines. For a brief instant, her fear that he would find his way over to her was matched only by her fear that he wouldn’t.

  Then he was there, beside her. She closed her eyes and simply breathed, her shoulders pushed back, small hands gripping the rail.

  “How are you this evening, Miss Lowry?”

  She turned her face to have a better look at him. “It’s Meg.”

  That smile. “Meg.” He gave an approving nod. “Am I standing too close?”

  “No?” She frowned in confusion, and he softly chuckled.

  “I only meant that I hope your boyfriend won’t worry about your talking to a strange man.”